Why Data Governance Leaders Need Both Tech & Business Expertise A strong data governance leader isn’t just someone who understands policies and compliance. They also need to know how data architecture actually works — and when IT needs support to ensure governance isn’t unintentionally undermined. Here’s why this mix is essential: ✅ Business Context – Governance leaders must understand how data drives business outcomes and delivers growth — not just how to govern it. ✅ Technology Awareness – Even well-intended governance policies can fail if they don’t align with the realities of how data is stored, structured, moved, and managed. ✅ Bridging the Gap – The best data governance leaders are skilled translators between business and IT, ensuring that governance is practical and scalable, while unlocking measurable business value. Data governance isn’t just about rules and definitions — it’s about execution as an enabler to the business. And execution requires collaboration. When governance and IT work together, data becomes a strategic asset rather than a constant challenge. What do you think? How much technical expertise should a data governance leader possess to be effective?
A business leader is needed to support the program and communicate effectively with the leadership on the progress of the Data Governance and furthermore keeps the trust with the business community whereas the technical leader excels at Architectures, Process, Data Quality, Catalog, MDM, and other aspects of the data management. You need experience in both domains to manage the program effectively and to bring the program to maturity. It is the right-hand, left-hand handshake.
could not agree more, well said.
Totally agree, Well said
Completely agree, Kevin. Business context is absolutely key. Technical ability is important but if I cannot be applied the business context then the iniative won’t be successful.
There is another, and maybe more important, expertise.. The ability to partner with others with a deeper expertise. A Data Governance Leader doesn't, and I will argue, shouldn't be this magical unicorn who is all things wrapped up in one. They need to be someone who understands enough to find the partners in the organization, and use their influence management to get things done. I have run data governance organizations in the manufacturers over the last 10 years, and in each, I have pushed the governance to the business functions. Since I am not an expert in the specific business's data, nor do I even know the right stakeholders, I work with others in the organization who do. My point is you need to be a leader more than anything else. Yes, a mix of skills is required, but if you have to look for a unicorn, you may be looking for a long, long time.
I believe both are important to run the Data Governance program effectively. If we start with business, we need to go down on technical stairs to learn about data. If we start with data, we need to climb up to learn about the business. In my experience, understanding data technically gets an opportunity to understand the business by doing exploratory analysis and reverse engineering. But unlike data management, which has limited exposure to the business, Data Governance has got higher exposure to the business. Thus the combination of both is required.
Makes sense. Really like the mix — copying it for an internal write-up. I’ve seen solid policies flop when they don’t reflect how data’s actually handled. And when it all gets pushed to IT after access issues… nothing good follows
Data Governance, Transformation, AI and Compliance Managing Director
4mothank you for calling this out. Its a very important point, very easily missed